My visitor does her best to persuade me but without success and at last I am obliged to explain my reasons for my refusal to co-operate in the experiment. I explain my reasons as follows: if Anne discovers my intelligence to be above average she will endeavour to educate me by lending me large volumes (like the volume upon Landscape Gardening) which are unsuitable for reading in bed, and by refusing to allow me to read The Body in the Cupboard and other books of that ilk which I find pleasant and soothing; on the other hand, if she discovers my intelligence to be below average she will despise me for evermore. I add with absolute finality, “No, Anne, I will not be weighed and measured and put into a pigeonhole. It’s better for both of us that I should remain an enigma.” She looks at me for a moment in blank amazement and then bursts out laughing. “Oh dear, you are so good for me!” she exclaims.
Tuesday, 24th July
At last a suitable day has been found for the long-promised expedition to Wandlebury. Tony calls for me after lunch and off we go at breath-taking speed.
I enquire why Tony is driving so much faster than usual.
“But I’m not,” he replies in surprise. “I always drive fast when I want to get anywhere—you ought to know that.”
Wandlebury is a small country town; there is a large square with a fountain in the middle and all round this square there are buildings of various degrees of antiquity. On one side there is a very ancient coaching inn called the Apollo and Boot with all the usual stables and outhouses attached; on another side stand the County Buildings and on the other two sides there are shops.
Tony parks Belshazzar in the square and announces cheerfully that he is perfectly free this afternoon and will accompany me on my shopping expedition and carry my basket. It is very kind of him. I have a feeling that I should get on much better alone, but nothing can be done about it.
The first item on my list is a pair of thick brown walking-shoes. I explain this to my companion and he replies that he knows the very place where these can be obtained and leads me across the square.
The shop is long and narrow and rather dark; there are no other customers in it but at the far end there are two girls, knitting jumpers and talking to one another earnestly the while. They pay no attention to us and, after waiting for a few moments, Tony takes the matter into his own hands.
“Sit down, Madame,” he says gravely. “It was walking-shoes you wanted? I think we have just what you require.”
The shelves are stacked with white boxes from floor to ceiling and Tony prowls around, taking them down and reading the labels aloud. “Glacé pumps . . . red and white strollers. Would you like to stroll, Hester? Beach sandals . . . satin slippers . . . green mules. I should hate to see a green mule so we won’t open that box. Hullo, this is more like it! Brown laced shoes! Do you take size three?”
“Four and a half,” I reply.
“How annoying of you!” exclaims Tony, throwing the box onto the floor, where already there is a pile of opened boxes and shoes of all sorts and sizes which he has discarded in his search. “How very annoying—but never mind, we’ll keep on trying. You wouldn’t like a navy and white court shoe, I suppose?” asks Tony, holding it up elegantly between his fingers and thumb.
“Could you recommend it for walking in a muddy country lane?”
“Well—frankly—no,” says Tony sadly. “And, as a matter of fact, it’s size six so it might be a little too big. Of course you could always wear a couple of pairs of thick socks for padding, couldn’t you?”
At this moment one of the girls approaches. She is fat and wears a bright green jumper—obviously knitted by herself—and she looks extremely cross. “Are you wanting anything?” she asks.
“Dear me, no,” replies Tony. “We’re just having fun. Please don’t bother about us.”
“You aren’t allowed to do this,” declares the girl, beginning to gather up the shoes and boxes. “You’re mixing everything up. It’ll take me ever so long to clear up this mess.”
“But I like doing it,” objects Tony. “I want to see what’s inside all those nice shiny boxes—all except the green mules. I don’t like mules at the best of times; they’re so unco-operative.”
“Does the lady want mules?” asks the girl in bewilderment.
Tony is too busy opening boxes to reply. “Dinky boots!” he announces. “Size four and a half, fur-lined with zip-fasteners! You can’t resist Dinky boots, Hester, especially when they’re exactly the right size.”
“Brown walking-shoes,” I murmur, struggling not to laugh.
“We’ve no walking-shoes,” says the girl.
“No walking-shoes!” cries Tony in amazement. “But what are shoes for? Shoes are made for walking, aren’t they? Calves are born and reared so that their skins can be made into walking-shoes . . .”
While he is talking Tony does not pause for a moment in his search. He opens box after box and strews them on the floor. The girl is trying vainly to sort them out and gather them up, but she is not as quick as Tony.
“I’ll fetch the manager,” she declares. “He’ll know what to say to you. I’ll go and fetch him now—this very minute.”
“Yes, do,” agrees Tony with alacrity. “Go and fetch the manager; I should like to see him. There are various things I should like to tell him; for instance I could tell him quite a lot about salesmanship. Perhaps he would take me in as an assistant—”
“The manager’s out!”
“Oh what a pity! But I could come back and see him later.”
“We haven’t got any walking-shoes,” declares the girl in desperation. “We haven’t any at all. Why don’t you go away and try somewhere else?”
“Because I don’t believe you,” replies Tony very softly. “All those nice shiny boxes and not one single pair of thick brown walking-shoes, size four and a half! The thing is incredible! Ah, what have we here?”
Tony holds a shoe aloft. It is brown as a chestnut and has a nice thick leather sole; there is no nonsense about the shoe—in fact it is a thoroughly sound, sensible piece of workmanship which looks exactly my size and exactly what I want. “Oh yes!” I exclaim rapturously. “Let me try it on!”
“That’s not a walking-shoe,” says the girl.
“Surely it isn’t a dancing-shoe?” asks Tony.
“No, of course not,” says the girl scornfully. “It’s a Scotch brogue—that’s what it is. If you’d asked for a Scotch brogue I’d have shown it to you.” She pronounces the word as if it rhymed with ague, but after all why shouldn’t she?
Tony kneels before me, shoe in hand. “There,” he says as he takes the shoe-horn and slips it on. “How does it feel?”
“Very comfortable.”
“Are you sure? No tightness across the instep?” asks Tony anxiously.
“It’s perfect,” I reply.
“Perfect,” agrees Tony nodding. “It’s neat and serviceable. You can walk through muddy country lanes without a care in the world when you’re wearing that shoe. That shoe was made for you.”
“I believe it was.”
“Wasn’t I clever to find it?”
“Very clever indeed,” I reply with absolute sincerity.
As a matter of fact I feel extremely grateful to Tony, for in these days of austerity it is seldom that one finds exactly what one wants. All too often one is obliged to search high and low and eventually in sheer desperation to buy something which one thinks will “do” but which rarely “does.”
Tony sits back on his heels and smiles with the satisfaction of a man who has accomplished a difficult and arduous task.
“Not only clever,” I tell him as I look round at the littered floor, “not only are you clever but also extremely persevering.”
“It’s just my nature,” he replies modestly. “All my confidential reports said the same thing. This officer is full of initiative and perseverance. When I take on a job I like to see it through to the bitter end.”
There is no more to be said. I pay for the shoes a
nd Tony takes the parcel. We leave the fat girl standing knee-deep in shiny boxes and emerge into the square.
“She thinks you’re mad,” I remark.
“No,” says Tony. “You under-rate her intelligence. She understands quite well. I think I’ve taught her something.” He sighs and adds: “It’s hard work being public-spirited.”
“But, Tony—”
“Seriously, Hester, we’ve got to do something about it. Unless we all take a firm stand and refuse to put up with laziness and incompetence things will go from bad to worse.”
“You mean we shouldn’t put up with bad service?”
“We mustn’t put up with it,” says Tony emphatically. “We mustn’t be lazy. It’s the same in a restaurant: if you’re given a cracked cup or a dirty plate you should make a fuss.”
“You might have reported that girl to the manager.”
“I hate reporting people. I prefer to deal with people in my own way; to make the punishment fit the crime.”
“You enjoyed it,” I tell him.
“Well—perhaps,” admits Tony, smiling.
The rest of my shopping is quickly done and we walk across the square to the Apollo and Boot where, Tony assures me, we shall get a very good tea. It is an attractive old place, half-timbered in Elizabethan style, with a painted sign hanging over the doorway. On the sign is depicted an extremely handsome Apollo clad in Grecian costume and an old-fashioned hunting boot.
“Why Apollo and Boot?” I ask as we go in . . . but Tony does not know.
The dining room is large and airy, it is full of little tables with snow-white cloths but we are the only people having tea. Tony knows the head-waiter, who has been here for years, and presently he comes over to our table in the window and chats with us. He is a thick-set man with a high forehead and a beaming smile, a benevolent creature who might easily have stepped straight out of Pickwick Papers.
“Edward,” says Tony. “Mrs. Christie wants to know why this inn is called the Apollo and Boot. Can you do anything about it?”
“Not really,” replies Edward, beaming more blandly than before. “I wish I could—that’s the truth. Lots of people ask about the name, but all we can say is it’s been called the Apollo and Boot for ’undreds of years. It’s called that in all the old documents. There was an old gentleman used to come ’ere and he said it might have been called the Pool and Boat at one time, but that’s just an idea. There isn’t no foundation to it, as you might say.”
“The Pool and Boat,” says Tony thoughtfully.
“Yes, sir,” agrees Edward. “That’s what the gentleman said. He was collecting names of inns—just like some people collect stamps—and there were a lot of funny ones in his book. He let me see his book one day and very interesting it was. There was the Bat and Steeple for instance—that’s down Portsmouth way—and the gentleman said it started off as the Bed and Stable.”
“A good name for an inn,” suggests Tony.
“Yes, sir, but very prosaic,” replies Edward gravely. “Not nearly so romantic—if you see what I mean. Perhaps the lady will agree with me?”
The lady agrees.
“Yes,” says Edward. “And the Pool and Boat is a poor sort of name compared to the Apollo and Boot.”
“You like romance, Edward,” says Tony. “Well, I don’t blame you. Life would be very hum-drum without it.”
“Just what I always say!” exclaims Edward, beaming from ear to ear. “You’d be surprised how much romance there is in my job—you really would. All sorts of things ’appen—interesting things. People meet each other and get engaged to each other—I’ve seen that ’appen more than once—and people quarrel with each other and make it up. There was a lady came ’ere last March—a very nice lady she was—and she asked me to sign my name on her Will. There’s romance for you!”
“Yes,” says Tony doubtfully. “I suppose there might be romance in a Will, though as a matter of fact my Will is a dull sort of affair, about a mile long and full of lawyer’s jargon.”
“This one wasn’t. It was short and sweet,” says Edward chuckling.
We have finished our tea by this time so we take leave of Edward and drive home through the leafy country lanes. We glide along slowly and smoothly which suits me down to the ground but I cannot resist the temptation to ask my companion why he is not racing along in his usual headlong fashion.
“Don’t you understand?” says Tony sadly. “It’s all a matter of mood. If I feel like speed I drive fast, but I always drive slowly if I don’t want to get to my destination quickly. Surely that’s simple enough.”
Wednesday, 25th July
I have invited Susan to come and see me this morning and have sent a summons to Edmond Alston. It is possible that Susan may not be the right angel but I have a feeling she is. Mrs. Daulkes has been told that I am expecting two young friends for coffee at eleven o’clock and, although this is all I have said, I can see from her manner that she is interested in my little party. She helps me to carry out three chairs, a small table and a rug and to arrange them beneath the beech tree—the one which is out of sight of Miss Crease’s bedroom window.
“There,” says Mrs. Daulkes. “That’s nice. I’ll bring out the coffee and biscuits when they come.”
Susan arrives first. She surveys the preparations and asks who else is coming; she is also curious to know why she has been invited. I reply that she has been invited to talk pleasantly to a young man who is reading medicine and working much too hard.
“Why me?”
“I thought a little female society would be good for him.”
“You could have asked Joan Meller,” says Susan, who is no fool.
I agree that this might have been possible if I had had the pleasure of Joan Meller’s acquaintance.
“I believe I’ve seen your young man,” says Susan thoughtfully. “I mean when you know everybody in a place like Old Quinings, a strange young man sticks out like a sore thumb. If it’s the one I’ve seen—walking about at a frightful pace with his dark hair blowing in the breeze—it’ll be rather interesting to meet him. I’ve seen him several times when I was out riding. One day he opened a gate for me.”
“Anyone would do that,” I tell her.
“You’d be surprised,” says Susan smiling. “Anyone doesn’t open gates for horsewomen nowadays . . . besides he opened it rather nicely.”
There is no time to say more (which perhaps is just as well) for at this moment the young man who opened the gate nicely emerges from the glass door of the drawing room.
“’Ere’s the young gentleman, Mrs. Christie!” cries Mrs. Daulkes, waving her duster in frantic excitement.
If there had been any doubt in my mind as to whether I had found the right angel—which of course there was not—it would have been dispelled at the sight of Edmond’s face as he advances across the lawn. It is the face of a young man who sees visions. Somehow I am rather frightened at the sight of Edmond’s face. I want to warn him to be careful. I want to wrap him in cotton-wool so that he shall not be hurt. I am frightened on my own account as well, and wish that I had not lent myself to this adventure. I see now that Edmond’s case is not merely a young man’s natural interest in a pretty girl; it is something much bigger and much more serious. What Susan’s feelings are I do not know. It is too late to regret my action and to wish I had been more prudent and less impulsive. I have involved myself in the affairs of these two young creatures and the outcome is in the lap of the gods.
“We’ve met before, haven’t we?” says Susan when the introductions are made.
Edmond agrees gravely. Today his dark hair is not blowing wildly in the breeze, but carefully brushed, and instead of his usual haphazard attire he is wearing a well-pressed flannel suit.
We sit down. Edmond and I choose chairs in the shade but Susan prefers to sit upon the rug in the full blaze of sunlight. Radiance surrounds her. It is almost dazzling to look at her. She is wearing a white tennis frock; her arms and legs are bare and v
ery slightly tanned; the sun glistens in her golden curls.
We talk about various matters—about opening gates and such-like manifestations of good-will—we drink coffee and eat little biscuits. At first the burden of the conversation is mine but presently I discover that Susan is doing most of the talking. I had intended to make some excuse and leave them to chat without the constraint of my presence (young people often get on better alone); now I have changed my mind for obviously my presence does not constrain them and besides I am responsible. This friendship must not advance too quickly.
But despite my presence it is advancing rapidly. Already they have abandoned generalities and are talking about themselves. Susan, picking idly at the grass is talking about her childhood and about the “unhappy things” she had to bear. (I know something of this, having heard it from Miss Phipps.)
“Daddy and Wanda are quite different,” Susan is saying. “Daddy never wants to leave the Manor House and Wanda loves travelling, so for years and years they didn’t get on very well. It made me unhappy because I loved them both and because I wanted an ordinary sort of life, like other girls, with an ordinary sort of father and mother . . . and I wanted a sister terribly much. I wanted a little sister younger than myself to play with. It’s lonely being only, you know.”
I watch her, not really listening to her words but more to the cadence of her pretty voice. I am in love with Susan myself so how can I blame Edmond for his infatuation.
“I am only, too,” says Edmond. “My father died when I was six but I remember him quite well—a big cheery man who played bears with me. He gave me a nice safe feeling. Perhaps I’m imagining the safe feeling,” says Edmond consideringly. “Perhaps it was just that I felt unsafe when he had gone.”
“You were the man of the family,” says Susan nodding. She is right, of course. The six-year-old Edmond was too heavily burdened and the strain on his nerves was too great. It is much easier to understand Edmond and to sympathise with his present troubles and difficulties when one knows of the troubles and difficulties of his childhood.
Mrs. Tim Flies Home Page 14